Lakeshore Erosion 



Article 500 of the Civil Code prevents the riparian " landowner from taking any 

 property rights in land exposed by the gradual receding of a lake (dereliction) or in the 

 gradual buildup of sediment on the lakeshore (alluvion). At the same time, Articles 450 

 and 452 hold that the bottoms of navigable water bodies are public things and incapable 

 of private ownership. Because the courts have ruled that the State owns the bottom of a 

 navigable lake up to the high watermark, Louisiana law, in effect places the private 

 property owner abutting a navigable lake, in a "no win" situation. If the lake shrinks due 

 to imperceptible natural causes, his property is separated from the water by a strip of 

 state-owned land. If his shoreline is eroding or his land is subsiding, the State takes title 

 to any land that is inundated by the expanding lake waters. 



It has already been noted that the equal footing doctrine requires that the state be 

 given title to all land under navigable waters when it enters the union. When Louisiana 

 was admitted to the Union in 1812, it was given ownership to all land beneath navigable 

 waters up to the high water mark. Because Article 500 prevents the State from losing 

 any land to the private riparian landowner, the threshold question of navigability assumes 

 critical importance when assessing the property law implicatons of shoreline erosion in a 

 coastal lake. If the water body was navigable in 1812, Article 500 dictates that the limit 

 of such navigable waters in 1812 is an immutable line in favor of the State. ''^ That is, 

 irrespective of the waterway's present navigability, the State will always own as much as 

 was navigable in 1812. Furthermore, erosion on lake shorelines serves to increase state 

 land ownership in direct proportion to the decrease in private property ownership. 



The Louisiana Supreme Court in Miami Corp. v State, '^^ summarized the rule: 



"It apppears to be the rule that where the forces of nature- 

 subsidence and erosion—have operated on the banks of a navigable 

 body of water, regardess of whether it is a body of fresh water or 

 the sec, or an arm of the sea, the submerged area becomes a portion 

 of the bed and is insusceptible of private ownership." 



Furthermore, 



"The mere fact that a portion of the bed of a navigable body of 

 water may have been formed by the action of natural forces does 

 not change the situation, for the rule is, that when submersion 

 occurs, the submerged portion becomes a part of the bed or bottom 

 of the navigable body of water in fact, and therefore the property of 

 the SJxite, by virtue of its inherent sovereignty, as a matter of 

 law."'^^ 



Under this rule, the determination that a body of water was navigable in 1812 will 

 dictate the legal consequences of erosion in a lake 170 years later. 



If the water body was not navigable in 1812 a different set of legal consequences 

 occurs. In such a case, the lake bottom is a private thing "^ and may be held by the 

 private property owner. Therefore, if subsidence creates a lake on private property after 

 1812 or enlarges (or shrinks) an existing but non-navigable lake, the owner does not lose 

 title to the land. If the lake that was non-navigable in 1812, becomes navigable due to 

 natural forces, the Civil Code and the jurisprudence of Louisiana provide no definite 



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